Lord Woolf: Costly inquiries sapping resources from justice budget

Independent inquiries are 'sucking huge amounts of resources' out of an unprotected justice budget, former Lord Chief Justice Lord Woolf has opined.

Speaking ahead of the chancellor's budget tomorrow, Lord Woolf admitted to delegates at Solicitors Journal Live that he feared cuts by the Treasury would affect the court and prison reform programmes previously promised to the Lord Chancellor and the Ministry of Justice last year.

'There is another round of budget cuts and justice is not a protected area,' he said. 'It is likely there will be further cuts, despite the rise in public inquiries to deal with public concerns. The effect on the resources that are available must be significant.

'We are in a situation where we must cut our cloth with the resources we have available and provide access to justice with what the system can afford.'

The crossbench peer said Dame Lowell Goddard faced a 'huge task' as she launched her independent inquiry into historic child sexual abuse, predicting it might take her over five years to complete.

'She has more and more on her plate,' he said. 'I don't believe I will see the results of her work. There is a danger that the task is so great that it might break the system.'

'Where does the government find the resources? We still have the Iraq inquiry. We should be thinking about priorities and expense, although I must stress that I am conscious of the needs of the victims,' he continued. 'We all have sympathy for victims of sexual misconduct of the grossest kind.'

Justice Goddard's inquiry began last week with legal submissions around the scope of her investigations into the late Lord Janner.

Referring to allegations made against deceased suspects, Lord Woolf asked: 'When the main culprit is not alive, and not able to give evidence, how can you have a proper trial?'

He added: 'If we have got the money to conduct these inquiries then I can see that they perform a service. My fear is that they are sucking huge amounts of resources from the justice system.

'We should be looking after the justice system for the needs of commerce and the individuals. Those inquiries can do a great deal but they are inevitably expensive if they are to be worthwhile. The question is, where are the priorities?'

Commenting on concerns over access to justice since the government introduced the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act 2012, Lord Woolf admitted: 'Like the Savoy Hotel, justice is available for all as long as you can pay for it. There has been continuous tension between access to justice and the need to pay for it.'

The former Master of the Rolls added that the middle classes faced a 'big problem' with accessing justice as they had been most affected by cuts to legal aid.

'Somehow we must find ways of enabling the public to have access to justice that is affordable,' he continued. 'Government resources have not increased in any way sufficiently to meet the public's need.'

Lord Woolf also raised concern over the judiciary's ability to continue to seduce leading practitioners to the bench, particularly in the commercial court, as 'the attractions of becoming a judge are reduced'.

The law lord rebuffed the suggestion of a career judiciary as an alternative to the current system of appointments as such judges would become 'like civil servants'.

On the subject of the recent court fee hikes, designed to make the court system pay for itself, Lord Woolf said that the government must act 'responsibly' with its charges on the public.

'The question of proportionality has been lost,' he explained. 'I would not approve of a government that asks for fees outside the scope of what has been provided. It should not place a burden on a particular section of the community.'

As a member of parliament's joint committee on human rights, Lord Woolf said he was not entrenched on proposals to scrap Labour's Human Rights Act and replace it with a new British Bill of Rights.

'I don't have any entrenched view that says we can't have our own Bill of Rights,' he said. 'But it should not be a Bill that provides inadequate rights. I wait to see the evidence, but it has got to be worthwhile.

Lord Woold opined that even the best lawyers will be puzzled by the British Bill of Rights: 'There will be great uncertainty. What will be the consequence of the new Bill of Rights?'

However, on the politically contentious subject of Brexit, Lord Woolf would not be drawn into discussion of the potential implications of a withdrawal from the EU for the legal profession until he had 'seen the evidence' and considered the referendum debate.

'It's an important challenge where we have to get to the right answer,' he said.